The Southern Tasmanian Veterans Cycling Club is desperately short of transponders for new members. If you have a transponder that you purchased from the club, and no longer use it, the club will be very happy to buy it back from you for $75, and then on sell it to a new member for the same price. Unfortunately that model transponder is obsolete, so new supplies are not available, and that has left a problem for people getting in to racing. Google "stvcc" to find the club site for details.Your assistance will be very much appreciated.I am not a club spokesman, merely a humble member very much in favour of retaining the use of the transponder system.

(Your wife need not know about this cash bonus; it is like buying bike gear, in reverse!)

Just a thougth. Have you guys thought about trying to reverse-engineer one? They generally arent that complex in side, and you may be able to get them made if you are willing to sacrifice one.

Good luck with the search.

cheersGlenn

-----------"Pain is temporary. It may last a minute, or an hour, or a day, or a year, but eventually it will subside and something else will take its place. If I quit, however, it lasts forever" Lance Armstrong

The card that came in the package with my unit is labelled:- "AMB Activ"

It is black and yellow in colour.

Any advice will be appreciated, as I really enjoy looking at my results in relation to my fellow competitors. It is what gets me out on the bike on Mondays, looking forward to another week of training. I am very keen to obtain any help or information that I can pass on to our committee members in an effort to have the use of the system continued.

This might seem a silly question, but have you contacted AMB? Not trying to sound smart, but they may still be able to manufacture a few of these if you ask for sufficient numbers.

cheersglenn

-----------"Pain is temporary. It may last a minute, or an hour, or a day, or a year, but eventually it will subside and something else will take its place. If I quit, however, it lasts forever" Lance Armstrong

It's the normal product lifecycle thing. AMB is not the only company to do this. They want to keep moving forward, and not be lumbered with the burden of supporting legacy systems. Eventually support for old product has to end. This is particularly so when a company gets bought out. The old stuff is not their work so they have no emotinoal commitment to it.

My employer pays tens of millions of dollars annually in software licences and support, and gets pretty much the same treatment from its vendors. They get told "support for this product ends on..." and it is up to us to make sure we stay inside the vendor's window of supported versions.

And to be fair to AMB, you've had your money's worth. Would you rather go back to manual timekeeping?

If funding a new system is an issue, I'd recommend contacting other bike clubs who may have recently upgraded and see about buying up compatible old parts at suitable prices. Otherwise, touch up your membership for some funds and go to the front of the product lifecycle and get latest AMB system (but not a 1.0 release) so that you get the maximum life from the system.

My first encounter with AMB was timing and race management for R/C cars in the 80s and 90s.

There's a guy on here, ALyCAT, who wrote and owns the IP for an AMB-compatible race management system by that name (Automatic Lap Counting And Timing) who may be able to help you with networking among his contacts with your quest for additional transponders.

Just a thought, there are several time keeping software packages out there. I wonder if your older transponders might work with the newer software?

Packages such as AMB MYLAPS and Slyfox are a couple that I know of. Even trying a demo version might help save some bucks here. As far as I am aware, the transponders only hold a number. Not being a techy here, I thought it might have been possible to use different software and still use your older transponders.

cheersGlenn

-----------"Pain is temporary. It may last a minute, or an hour, or a day, or a year, but eventually it will subside and something else will take its place. If I quit, however, it lasts forever" Lance Armstrong